X-Com: Enemy Unknown
by joethulhu
Summary: Trying my hand at a novelization. I know, what an original title. I can't think of a better one, though. The US Secretary of Defense interrogates the lone survivor of the X-Com unit in an attempt to figure out just what happened, how it all went wrong, and who is responsible.
1. Prologue

"Bring him in."

The secret service agents nodded and left the room. There was a burly, dirty-looking man sitting outside, his clothing tattered and scorched, his hair swept upwards and singed at the top. They grabbed him by his elbows and led him into the office, sitting him down in the chair facing the desk, whereupon sat the Secretary of Defense for the US government. The Secretary of Defense pushed his glasses up his nose, then slid a folder forward on the desk towards the man. The folder was labeled, in large red text:

X-COM

"Tell me what you know."

The man looked up with an odd smile.

"So, the old US of A has taken it upon themselves to explain what happened? Going to take all the credit, as usual, I see?"

The Secretary of Defense glared at the man. He was not pleased.

"I don't think I like your tone, sir. I can have you arrested and charged with treason on the spot if I so wish. I think you'd better calm down and start telling me what happened. Let's start with your name."

"Name? My name's Michael Parker. They used to call me 'Deadeye'."

"Why'd they call you that?"

"Because I could hit a sectoid between the eyes from a hundred yards. I was the best soldier they had. And they had some damn good soldiers."

"If the soldiers were so good, what happened to them all?"

The soldier laughed hoarsely.

"You want to know what happened? I'll tell you... Right from the beginning."

...

I was a veteran of the Gulf War. Top rank in my squadron. I'd been sitting without work for years, enjoying the relative peace, dealing with the PTSD. One day a man in a suit came knocking on my door. There was something about him - I couldn't quite make out his face. He had a booming voice, a commanding voice, and I felt that I couldn't possibly resist anything he said if I tried.

"Colonel Parker."

I thought he was going to say something more, but after a few seconds passed I realized he was waiting for me to assure him of my identity.

"Yes... That's me."

"Your presence is requested at a council of nations."

"My presence? But... Why?"

"You will be informed upon the commencement of the meeting."

"And what if I don't go?"

Even though I was somehow compelled to follow his orders, I wasn't going to do so blindly. I needed more information.

"You will go."

With that, the man in the suit turned and walked away from my door step. I closed the door behind him and sat in my living room, contemplating what had just happened. I realized he hadn't told me a date, time or location for the council. The next day an envelope containing a single plane ticket was slipped through my mail slot. The flight was from Washington, D.C., two days from then. I live in Philadelphia. I had to pack and leave for D.C. as fast as possible.

Once I had arrived at the airport, the clerks weren't very friendly. They told me my flight didn't exist. I told them of course it did, I had a ticket for it. Eventually one of them called their superior and reported the ticket as a fake. The superior told her something and when she hung up the phone, she was much friendlier. She told me to come with her, and led me to a small plane, with only enough seats for about a dozen passengers. I sat in the foremost one, and was eventually joined by two others. One was a young upstart named Richard Reynolds. He told me that he was a scientist, and one of the best in the field. I wasn't much one for science so I decided to believe him. He told me about how he'd split atoms in his backyard as a teenager. It was all gibberish to me, but I took a liking to the lad. He was very optimistic, and in my career that was something I'd learned to value.

The other two that joined us were like myself - vets. Patrick Hill was a beefy guy. In my old squad we used to call people like him beaters. Beaters go in and do whatever they can to destroy their enemy, preferably breaking as many bones and causing as much pain as possible along the way. They're usually not sadists - they just do a thorough job.

James Day was terribly soft-spoken for a soldier. It must've been PTSD, but he barely spoke two words in the entire flight, and those were his name. He looked haggard and restless. I didn't want to disturb him.

None of us had any idea what we were being called to this meeting for. Reynolds thought it had something to do with the rash of disappearances all over the globe, disappearances from bedrooms in the middle of the night, usually with family members sleeping nearby, undisturbed - and with no signs of a disturbance. Weird stuff, but I just chalked it up to normal criminal activity, maybe a few people offing themselves or running away to escape the lives they led.

I was dead wrong.


	2. Council of Nations

I can't say where the plane flew us. Not because I'm in an NDA; because I don't know. It was over the ocean somewhere. If I had to I would guess it was in the North Pacific, but I can't even be sure of that. It was almost like a floating battle station. It was bare, without any armaments, but it looked ready for some kind of military occupation. There were strange-looking fighter jets stationed on three large platforms - two with long wings, and heavy canons on each, and one the size of a D-Day troop transport. We weren't allowed a long glance at them before we were shoved down into the belly of the whale. The pilot, along with a few suits, led us into a large, dark room with an oblong mahogany table and about fifty chairs around the sides. At least half of them were filled with people of all ethnicities and nationalities. We were all led to our seats, getting comfortable in the leather cushions. Around half an hour passed as similar small groups of people filtered into the room. Some of them tried to start up conversations but it seemed that no one was willing to talk. Once the last seat had been filled, a man on the end of the table, his face in shadow, stood to speak. There were around a hundred people seated at the table, and each one gave their complete and focused attention.

"For clarity's sake this meeting will be held in English. All those attending are known to speak English fluently. Is that correct?"

One by one, everyone at the table gave the affirmative. The man nodded and continued.

"We have brought you here because you are the best of the best. Each and every one of you is in the top one percentile of your respective fields."

The man raised up a small remote and pushed a button. Suddenly, in the middle of the table, a large three-dimensional hologram of Earth appeared. It was covered with small red dots, with a large blue square in the Pacific that I guessed was the base.

"This facility has been created with the latest technology - gadgets that won't be available to the public for fifteen years or more. This is the Geoscape, developed by a Russian technician who is also the chief scientist on staff here at the base. The red dots you see are the locations of the unexplained disappearances all of you have no doubt been hearing about over the past few months. It is now time to reveal to the world what the nature of these disappearances is."

The man pushed another button and the Geoscape disappeared from view. He pressed a few more and a plus-shaped object appeared in front of all of us.

"This is an object which has appeared above the skies in each disappearance case. It is the belief of this council of nations that these disappearances are, in fact, abductions - by an intelligent form of extraterrestrial life."

What would have been a bombshell in a public meeting was met with quiet acceptance among the members of the meeting. If you're in the military as long as I have been you start to have suspicions, and I suspected that the scientists here knew even more than I did.

The shadowy man pressed another button and an image of a small, rotund body with large, almond-shaped eyes appeared in the center of the table.

"These are the beings that have been witnessed and occasionally photographed at these abductions. The few scientists who have been privy to this knowledge, all of which are present at this meeting, have named these creatures Sectoids."

Patrick Hill, the heavy soldier from the plane ride, spoke up.

"Sir, I can see where this is going, so just tell me two things: where are they, and how do I kill them?"

"I admire your dedication," the man replied. "The answer to that query is the purpose of this meeting."

The man pushed a button on his remote and the display plinked out of existence.

"Gentlemen, twenty-six of you are soldiers from various militaries across the globe. Some of your respective countries have antagonized each other multiple times across the years, but for the sake of the greater good the Council is asking you to ignore any and all grievances. This is not about politics. This is about the survival of the human race. We are being invaded by an extraterrestrial intelligence with extreme hostile intentions and vastly superior technology. We are recruiting you as members of a new Extraterrestrial Combat Unit, codename X-Com. The scientists we have gathered here have a duty to research salvaged extraterrestrial materials and captured entities, to research their technologies and use them against their own inventors.

"This is basically hopeless. There is almost no possibility of success here. This will assuredly be a suicide mission. However, if you refuse, humanity is lost."

For a long while not a word was said. No one seemed to want to speak up. Finally, I decided to take the initiative. I grunted and stood, shoving my chair back. All eyes were on me.

"I'm in."

Those two words were enough to spark the crowd. Every single person at the table stood and pledged their loyalty to the survival of the human race. The shadowy man in the suit seemed pleased.

"Good. You are all dismissed. You will find your quarters below, within this facility. It is currently December 30th, 1998. You have one day to prepare. The X-Com project will be activated on January 1st, 1999. On the first day of every month you will all meet here to discuss funding. Currently the world nations of the USA, Russia, the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, China, Japan, India, Brazil, Australia, Nigeria, South Africa, Egypt and Canada are providing funding to the project. At any time, a nation may be dissatisfied with your performance and withdraw from the project. All nations have also made it clear that if survival becomes hopeless, they may sign pacts with the extraterrestrials in order to secure their survival. Every aspect of this project is at high risk. The end result will be either the downfall or the survival of the human race. Good luck."


	3. First Encounter

The two days we spent preparing for the upcoming war (as the soldiers had decided it would be) were tense and nerve-wracking. I knew how to kill another human in ten seconds flat, with no hesitation. But these weren't people. There were aliens. Creatures from outside of the solar system. None of us had a clue how to deal with them. A few of the soldiers had breakdowns, but they were assured by the scientists that we could pull through.

At midnight New Year's Eve the scientists were instructed to activate the sensors. The latest satellite technology, they could detect any flying body wider than a meter for a range of ten thousand miles. In short, they would have no trouble detecting an alien UFO before it landed, as long as it was on the same hemisphere. The weakness here was obvious, but the scientists assured us they were hard at work establishing a secondary base on the opposite hemisphere, in order to cover virtually the entire surface of the earth. With such a large range, it wasn't long before something entered the sights.

Three A.M., January 2nd. I was sleeping, when an alarm blasted through the quarters.

"X-COM SQUAD ONE, REPORT TO HANGER BAY ONE IMMEDIATELY."

Lucky me, I was the second-in-command for Squad One. There were eight of us. My superior was Colonel Henry Gautier, a high-ranking officer in the French military. He was a nice enough guy, but he didn't speak the best English - just enough to understand you and give good orders, but not enough to hold a real conversation. He was a good commander, with very strong leadership skills.

The others were just rookies in the X-Com ladder. The very top of us had been appointed ranks by the brass - Gautier was a sergeant, and I was but a squaddie. The rest in Squad One were lowly rookies. Matthias Gunkel, the German sniper - I saw him bull's eye a target from one end of the base to the other once. Damien Bradley, the English rifleman - a damn good shot, but reckless. Virgil Webb, the American assault soldier - foul-mouthed and with an attitude, but he could command a submachine gun like no other. Kenji Matsamura, the Japanese medic - quick on his feet and handy with a pistol, in additon to being one of the best field medics I've had the pleasure to know. Emile Cuvelier was a member of Gautier's old squad - apparently, he'd been specially requested. He didn't talk much, so I don't know what his official position was, but he was a fine soldier. The final member of the squad was the man I had the pleasure of not speaking to on the flight over - James Day.

When we arrived at the hangar bay, we saw the transport that I had witnessed on deck earlier. The Commander called it the Skyranger. It held a good fourteen men, but for now each squad was limited to eight due to the general shortage of soldiers that the head brass felt were good enough. We piled in and suited up. The scientists instructed us to capture the alien technology in as good a condition as we could. The craft we were to intercept had landed in a small town in Kansas, right in a farmer's field. We were to exterminate the aliens as quickly as possible and report back with the salvaged technology from the downed craft. We were armed with simple pea-shooters - I doubted we would make much of a resistance with normal ballistic weaponry, but it was all we had. No armor, either - the standard combat armor of the world's military would be torn through at the same rate as plain cloth, so why bother? This were not looking up for X-Com, but we were all determined not to let the human race be dominated.

...

We could see the UFO from a great deal away. It was dawn by the time we arrived. The shadows were long and the large craft stood out. There didn't seem to be any aliens scampering about, but we could never be sure. Scans showed five non-human life forms. With a jolt, we landed, and the doors of the Skyranger opened up for us.

"Fan out, slowly," commanded Sergeant Gautier. "Bradley, Webb - scout out that building over there. Gunkel, hang back behind the rest of us and keep yourself on overwatch. Matsamura, watch Bradley and Webb. Stick close but stay behind. Keep yourself in cover. Emile, Day, Parker - come with me. We're going to assault the enemy craft."

Everyone gave the acknowledgement that they'd heard his orders and began to follow through on them. The building Gautier had singled out for scouting by Bradley and Webb was a small, two-storey farmhouse. There was no sign of the farmer who had lived here previously.

Slowly, we advanced upon the UFO. Cuvelier and I put out shoulders against the walls of the craft, facing the door. Gautier approached it slowly. When he reached out to touch it, it slid open. The corridors were a dull, chrome grey - they matched the outside. Two corridors led to the left and the right. It seemed abandoned. The Sergeant moved inside and motioned for Cuvelier and myself to follow him. He instructed Day to keep watch. We peered down the long corridors, but no one seemed to be at home. Suddenly, the Sergeant's radio buzzed.

"Bradley here - activity in the second floor of the farmhouse. Possible tango. Should I proceed?"

The Sergeant grabbed the radio with his left hand, his right keeping his assault rifle pointed down the corridor.

"Affirmative, soldier. Investigate possible enemy. Be careful."

The radio buzzed the affirmative and then went dead. Once more we proceeded slowly along the corridors. Cuvelier and Gautier went down the left and I took the right. I soon reached another door, like the one on the front of the craft.

"Sergeant," called on my radio, "there's another door here. Should I proceed?"

"Negative, soldier," came the response. "Wait for my signal - we'll enter at the same time and hopefully catch them by surprise."

"Tango spotted!" came the excited yelp from my radio. It was Gunkel - he must have seen one in the window of the farmhouse.

"Do you have the shot?" came the Sergeant's reply.

"Affirmative, Sergeant, but... I've never seen anything like it! It's grotesque!"

"Take the shot, soldier."

There was a moment of silence, before a colossal crack from a sniper rifle burst through the air.

"Tango down," came the crackle on the radio. "I hit him right between the eyes. His cranium burst into a thousand green sprinkles."

"Good work," said the Sergeant. "Bradley, do you have a visual on the body?"

"Affirmative, sir. We're about to investigate it."

My radio begin to crackle with a direct communication.

"It's almost time," said the Sergeant. "On my mark. Three... Two... One!"

The Sergeant and I burst through the doorway, coming face to face with the creatures we'd seen on the hologram. There were three of them, two facing me and one facing the Sergeant, who opened fire immediately. The Sectoid closest to him managed to dodge out of the way in time, and opened fire on him. The sound of an alien weapon was odd - something like you'd hear in Star Wars or another science-fiction film. A green bolt of energy shot out of it and into the wall beside Sergeant Gautier. The two Sectoids closest to me were distracted by this, and I opened fire. My assault rifle was set to fire in three-shot bursts, and the second shot connected with the nearest Sectoid, blowing his fragile skull to bits. The third merely dented the wall, and the remaining Sectoid was once more focused on myself. Before he could let off a shot of his weapon, I blew another burst fire at him and he went down.

"Good work, soldier," the Sergeant said to me from across the room. "Go assist Bradley and Webb in the farmhouse. Emile and I will try and salvage the equipment."

I nodded and turned to leave, when our radios burst into life once more.

"Enemy spotted!"

It was Bradley. He seemed shaken.

"They hit Webb - I repeat, Webb is down! Bradley requesting backup, immediately!"

The Sergeant took hold of his radio.

"All soldiers, drop everything and assist Bradley. Repeat, back up Bradley at once. Matsamura, get to Webb as soon as possible and provide immediate medical assistance."

I ran as fast as my legs would carry me. When I left the craft, I saw Day kicking open the door of the farmhouse and rushing in. There was a lot of gunfire. I motioned towards Gunkel, who was hesitantly hanging back at the Skyranger.

"Come on Gunkel, let's go kick some alien ass!"

Gunkel smiled grimly and rushed at the farmhouse by my side. We could hear Bradley's screams - whatever had gotten to Webb had taken Bradley as well. Day was running up the stairs, taking them three at a time. As soon as he got to the top he opened fire. Gunkel and I ran right behind him. When I got a glimpse at the creature that might have claimed the lives to two of my squad mates, I was surprised. It looked like a Sectoid - but its head was larger, bulging, with a red tint. It carried a large weapon with a red power unit in the middle, and took no time in shooting Day in the shoulder with it. Day toppled and fell to the bottom of the stairs, and I rushed forward to take his place. A few burst fires from my assault rifle impacted on the wooden walls of the farmhouse, but still managed to miss the Sectoid. I realized I was running low on ammunition, and ducked back to reload. Matsamura, meanwhile, was working feverishly trying to resuscitate Webb. Gunkel couldn't seem to get a clear shot at the Sectoid - the pressure was getting to him, and I couldn't really blame him. This was a new enemy from a planet mankind might not have even known existed, and it was beginning to wage war on us.

I snapped the new clip into place and jumped up just in time to see the Sectoid threatening Matsamura. He was frozen in place, apparently by some kind of mind powers that the Sectoid seemed to command. I realized I couldn't manage to squeeze my trigger either. Slowly, as if in a film, I saw Matsamura struggle against the alien's mind control, fumbling with the pistol on his belt. He brought it up slowly to the side of the Sectoid's head. The creature seemed puzzled.

"Welcome to Earth," said Matsamura, pulling the trigger and splattering the Sectoid's brain cavity all over the top floor of the farmhouse.


End file.
